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A good singer doesn't need much. A piano to knock out songs, a band to play 'em, a room somewhere to get it all down on magnetic tape. Sure, some may want unlimited tracks on a hard disk booted up with digital miracles. But all they need is eight tracks, one room, nine friends – and five days.
"I dunno, I get these bloody crazy ideas," says Andrew Morris. "I'd been playing a lot of solo guitar gigs and written my last three albums on guitar and felt I wanted to do something different, set myself a new challenge. So I bought a piano and decided to write a whole record on it.
"I've always loved soul music and I was keen to record the way they used to record those old soul records, everyone standing together in the same room, all the instruments bleeding into all the mikes, the Phil Spector idea where you get this kind of big symphony of sound. So that's what we did."
Neither his boldness nor his new album's soulful brilliance will surprise those who have followed Andrew's rapid-fire career so far. Needs & Wants marks another distinct change in style and setting from his alt-country origins and the polished rock of last year's Union Bars album.
That was a meticulously crafted and intimate affair, produced by Machine Translations' cottage studio wiz, J Walker. Needs & Wants is the exact opposite: an all-in soundstage epic with Hammond and horns swinging and a hot backup vocal trio of Claire Bowditch, Sime Nugent and Laura Jean.
"I've wanted to work with (producer) Marty Brown for a while, who I'd met through his wife, Claire Bowditch, and the stars finally aligned," says Andrew. "He had five days spare to record the album, basically live to tape, and we managed to throw together this incredible band."
On the first day of recording, Andrew remembers being picked up by keyboard player Steve Hesketh (Jet, Paul Kelly) and noticing his demo still unopened on the floor of his car. He suspects a similar amount of preparation from bassist Pat Bourke (Dallas Crane, Tex Perkins) and drummer Roger Bergodaz. But that's the way these guys work.
"They're all pretty handy Melbourne musicians," Andrew laughs. "It was basically a question of playing a song first, letting the guys hear it, and away we went.
"I love the idea that it's fresh, that the band's hearing it for the first time right there. With rehearsal and stuff it would be a very different sounding record. But there's something about that spontaneity that I love."
The electric atmosphere at Adelphia Studios in Fitzroy is palpable on Needs & Wants. It's there from the dramatic opener, "Hilltop", a letter from the cusp of life and death, and in the brassy swing of the song that gives the album its title, "Don't Know What I Want".
"It's about weighing up what you value in life," Andrew says. "It felt topical. We went through a long period of economic prosperity where it seemed there was more focus on material things than things that actually count. But it applies to any context – relationships, anything. I suppose that's what the album is about: finding out what's really important."
The theme weaves through Andrew's more political songs, such as "Domino", a lament for environmental integrity, and "One By One", a reminder of the debt still owed to Australia's stolen generations.
It's also there in his most personal moments, in the rare melodic elegance of the piano-vocal centerpiece, "A Lonely Goodbye", in the epic regret of "Bone Dry", and in "Nothing Last Forever", a song that plucks optimism from mortal defeat, "a reminder to enjoy what we have now, in this moment," says Andrew.
By accident or design, Needs & Wants is a living example of this philosophy. The immediacy of the recording is loaded with truly heroic moments, not least in Andrew's vocals, which have never sounded more full-blooded and confident, either leading the huge soul choir chorus of "Alone Without You" or wailing "the subconscious blurt" of the first single, "Lover".
"I sang that at Marty's studio on the last day, on the way to the airport," Andrew laughs. He nailed it in one – then caught the plane home. Needs & Wants is that kind of album.
Needs and Wants Track Listing: 1. Hilltop 2. Don’t Know What I Want 3. Domino 4. Lover 5. Alone Without You 6. A Lonely Goodbye 7. Nothing Lasts Forever 8. Price To Pay 9. Lady Venus 10. Bone Dry 11. One By One 12. Sunrise
Needs & Wants will be in store and online March 7, 2009 through ABC Music and Universal Music Australia.
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